I said I’d wrap up Mazes and Monsters today, but there’s just TOO MUCH GOOD MATERIAL in this movie. Every word falls from these kids’ mouths like gold coins from the mouth of the girl in that one fairy tale. The fairly tale with the frogs, maybe? I believe Tom Hanks is the frog in this analogy. The point of the analogy, in case you’ve forgotten it, is that it will take me two weeks to finish extracting game material from Mazes and Monsters.

I should have learned by now that when it comes to blogging Mazes and Monsters, I should always double my initial estimates. I originally thought this would be a 6-post series. It looks now like it will be at least 16 posts, and maybe something like 20,000 words. And I’m only scratching the surface of what could be done! Mazes and Monsters is a game so different from other RPGs of its time that a company could devote a whole product line to it. It really merits expansions, modules, a line of paper minis, and a Saturday morning cartoon with Vin Diesel as the voice of Tom Hanks. And vice versa!

I’ll do one more week of recap, and then maybe a week or two where we can grapple with some unresolved rules questions, like “What exactly is the combat system?” My hope is to make available a PDF of the complete game system by Christmas!

Now on to the recap:

Last time, we followed Tom Hanks on his murderous rampage through Manhattan. This time, his friends have figured out that Hanks’ map bearing the legend “The Two Towers” isn’t a Tolkien reference: it refers to WTC. That means we get a cringe-inducing chase through the Twin Towers, that goes on forever. Seriously, I think Hanks and his friends visit every floor. It’s like that interminable part of Final Fantasy VII inside the Shinra building, except more boring and uncomfortable.

Tom Hanks’ friends finally corner him on the roof just as he is about to jump off.

JJ: Pardieux, what are you doing?
Hanks: I’m going to join the Great Hall!
Blondie: (with infinite guile) You can’t! It’s a trap!
Hanks: I have spells! I’m going to fly!
JJ: You don’t have enough points! I am the maze controller, and i have absolute authority in this game.

POINTS! Confirmation that Mazes and Monsters uses a spell point system. Could Gary Gygax’s DMG reference to alternate game systems, with their cumbersome spell-point mechanics, have been targeted at Mazes and Monsters?

Sadly, since we’ve mostly seen Iglacia the fighter’s character sheet, we don’t have any idea what the scale is for spell points. We saw Tom Hank’s character sheet, but it was a childish chickenscratch scrawl. So we’ll have to guess.

Based solely on the fact that Iglacia had 181 Hit Points at level 9, let’s say that Spell Points are in the ballpark of 20 points per level. So at level 9, Pardieux the Holy Man can’t cast Fly. Of course, he may have already used up some of his Points: on that failed spell against the thugs, for instance. (What was that spell? It seemed to involve flower petals. Maybe it was a Wizard of Oz-inspired sleep spell.)

Why do Holy Men get 20 points per level, and not, say, 10? Maybe spells cost around 10 points per level, and the design intent is that spellcasters can cast 2 spells of the highest level during an adventure, or multiple lesser spells. Maybe less-powerful casters get less points.

Spell Points
Characters find magical Spells, Tricks, and Powers during maze exploration. These spells can be used over and over again – they are not used up. The characters, however, have a limited capacity to cast these spells represented by Spell Points.

Holy Men gain 20 Spell Points per level. Frenetics gain 10 per level. Fighters don’t gain Spell Points and thus cannot use Spells, Tricks, or Powers.

When characters cast a spell, the spell’s cost is deducted from their Spell Point total. Spell Points regenerate to their maximum value only after characters leave the maze forever. (There may be other items and features, like magical springs or bitter roots, that restore spell points as well. This is up to the discretion of the Maze Controller.

With this info, we can start slotting in spells. We’ve seen Fly; we’ve theorized Sleep; and earlier, Tom Hanks failed at casting a Raise Dead spell.

Spells

Sleep: Level 9. Cost: 90 SP. A single subject must make a RONA check or fall unconscious. (The points are spent whether or not the subject is affected.) This is a favored spell of Holy Men and others who prefer to resolve combats without bloodshed.

Fly: Level 10. Cost: 100 SP. The caster, or another character of his choice, is able to fly for the next hour.

A flying character who takes off from a sufficiently high point (at least 1300 feet off the ground) who flies straight up for the entire hour can reach Heaven.

Raise Dead: Restores a dead person to life. It only works for a short period after the person’s death; after that, you need to fly to Heaven to find them.

Next week, Tom Hank’s magnificent monologue, in which he delivers a performance on par with Skeletor’s monologue from “Masters of the Universe!”

After Tom Hanks’ disappearance, his three friends are interviewed separately by a scary detective, who seems intent on trapping them in an admission that they play Mazes and Monsters. They’re perfectly willing to sell Hanks up the Mazes and Monsters river, though. They claim that he played with a Mazes and Monsters group whose identities are shrouded in mystery.

Detective: Who’d he play with?
Kate: I – I don’t know. He never talked about that part of it. … I don’t think he really realized how dangerous the game was.
Detective: (significant pause) Was Robbie a doper?

Finally the Detective explains his theory about Hanks’ disappearance.

Detective: One of the players that Robbie played with… got carried away and killed him.
Blondie: That’s kind of far out.
Detective: Mazes and Monsters is a far out game. Swords… poison… spells… battles… maiming, killing…
Blondie: Hey, it’s all in the imagination!
Detective: Is it…?

We’re so lucky that the Detective knows so much about Mazes and Monsters game rules!

Introduction
Mazes and Monsters is a far out game.

Equipment
Poison: Applied to a weapon or to food or drink, Poison instantly kills the subject with no possibility of survival. Similar to Traps, the Maze Controller is obligated to give the following disclaimer to the players about any poisoned – or potentially poisoned – item: “Be wary: it may be harmless… but it may be poisoned.”

Maiming
Whenever a character is hit, the Maze Controller should roll a d12. On a roll of 1, the character is Maimed. The Maze Controller should roll again on the Maim Subtable.

Maim Subtable
1: The character is instantly killed.
2: Loses a hand or arm.
3: Loses a foot or leg.
4: Loses an eye.
5-6: Facial disfigurement. Character takes -2 on all Charm spells.
7-8: Concussion. Character is Mazed.
9-11: Permanent scar; character looks awesome. No other effect.
12: Flesh wound: Character got lucky… this time. No effect.

In the next scene, we’ve finally caught up with the beginning of the movie, which, as you remember, started with a bunch of cops and reporters gathered around the entrance of Pequod Caverns. They’re looking for a missing Mazes and Monsters player who’s lost in the caves. This is the moment that’s been foreshadowed for the whole movie: cave jaunt after cave jaunt has promised us tragedy, only to deliver anticlimactic safety. And… that’s what happens again. After the search for Hanks in the cave turns up empty, we see Hanks stumbling through Times Square, looking lost, confused, dazzled – just like every other Times Square tourist, in other words. Tom Hanks isn’t in Pequod Caverns at all!

So the whole uproar at the caverns was for nothing. It’s almost as if the message of the movie is that clueless adults are creating a media frenzy based on misinformation and speculation, and that you can’t trust reporters and writers to get their facts straight before they propagate panicked jeremiads. But of course, that’s not the case. Mazes and Monsters IS dangerous. Just look what happened to Tom Hanks.

Hanks’ friends decide that since the cops haven’t found anything, they’ll have to find Hanks themselves, using their GAME SKILLS.

Kate decides that “The Great Hall” isn’t a place – it’s a person! Hanks’ little brother ran away to New York City on a Halloween past, and he was named Hall.

By the way, here’s how popular “Hall” is as a first name. Not very popular. Its best year was 1881 where .007% of boys were named Hall.

Also Kate didn’t really use her GAME SKILLS to remember that fact, unless “game skills” and “knowledge of Tom Hanks” are synonymous, which, in a way, maybe they are. After all, you can’t write a real history of RPGs without frequently mentioning Tom Hanks. My RPG group did enjoy many sessions of FASA’s ‘burbrun, and who can forget the hit White Wolf scored with Joe: The Volcano?

While Kate recreates Tom Hank’s family tree, the boys apply game logic to determine his next move:

JJ: Where would a Holy Man go?
Blondie: (thinking with visible effort, then having a Thought) On a quest!
JJ: Exactly!

Holy Men go on quests.

More precisely, Holy Men go on quests to New York.

Next week, we’ll catch up with Tom Hanks in the Big Apple. Will his spells be enough to defeat these goofy New York hoodlums?

Jay Jay is throwing a Halloween party! Jay Jay is dressed as Noel Coward. Blondie is a naval officer. Kate is, uh, the naval officer’s girlfriend? (I forgot to mention, Blondie and Kate hooked up at the end of the last scene.)

The party also contains Frankensteins, maids, Darth Vaders, and pirates. (No mummies. Too bad. A mummy is, like, the easiest Halloween costume. All you need is gauze, or, in a pinch, toilet paper.) Everyone is bopping to generic 80s party music, except Tom Hanks, who is stalking through the party with the spooky asceticism of one who has been visited by the Great Hall. Hanks is dressed like a Holy Man. But it’s NOT A COSTUME.

Hanks leaves the party and closes the door. He lays his hand on the door in a mystic gesture.

This peculiar gesture is undoubtedly some Holy Man spell, meant to prevent his friends from following him.

Spells

Lock Portal: By laying his hand on a door, a Holy Man can lock it for a few hours. Anyone who tries to force the door or open it with a key must succeed on a RONA based on the Holy Man’s level.

At this point in my notes from the first time I watched the movie, I have the following puzzling scrawl:
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Remember the caves? They were featured, ominously, in the first shot of the film, and then Jay Jay was going to commit suicide there, but didn’t, and then the players LARPED there without incident. It seems that something is finally happening there!

Katie drives by the cave and sees a car parked nearby. Panicked, she rushes in to save … Blondie? He confesses that he has been mapping the caves between official game sessions. “”I wanted to figure out where Jay Jay hid the treasure.”

Katie and Blondie get home safe. Another fake-out where no one gets lost in caves. Something is going to happen there soon, though, I can just feel it!

What we learn from Blondie’s confession about “the treasure”, though, is that there is just one treasure at the heart of every maze! It sounds like when you find the treasure, you win the maze. Players have a lot of motivation to find the best possible route to the treasure, avoiding unnecessary dangers and obstacles.

This is how early editions of D&D worked too. Most of players’ XP was earned from treasure; wandering monsters were things to be avoided. By third edition D&D, though, character advancement came primarily from combat. If you skipped the combats, you’d never level up.

We’d better codify this in our Mazes and Monsters rules.

The maze treasure

At the center of every Maze in Mazes and Monsters is a treasure! The object of Mazes and Monsters is to find this treasure. Only by finding the treasure will the characters gain the wealth, powers, and spells they need to gain Levels and defeat their personal problems. Be wary, though: every treasure will be guarded by formidable obstacles!

I think that, while the bulk of XP in Mazes and Monsters comes from finding the Treasure, you must also get some XP from incidental encounters. After all, everyone was excited when the party met a dozen bloodthirsty undead!

How long to level 9?

I have another question about gaining levels. All the players are so proud of having level 9 characters. How hard is this? How long does it take to get to Level 9?
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I’ve been blogging the Mazes and Monsters RPG for about two months now, which is a long time in internet land, so, just in case you’re new to the project:

I’m watching Tom Hanks’ Mazes and Monsters to glean the rules of the Mazes and Monsters RPG. So far, the game players (Hanks, Jay Jay, Kate, and the blond guy) have stolen costumes from the college theater department and LARPed in a dangerous cave, and Tom Hanks has gone totally insane, hallucinated a fight with an evil monster, and broken up with Kate because a spectral figure called “The Great Hall” told him to.

Now we’re all caught up!

Confused and hurt by her breakup with Hanks, Kate meets Blondie in a diner (apparently there is a diner on campus? it seems to be called “Fat City”) for some post-breakup flirtation, and to ask whether Hanks might be acting a little more… Pardieuxy than usual. Blondie is unable or unwilling to recognize the change in Hanks’ personality.

GIRL: What about his blessing people all the time and giving his stuff away and acting so holy?
BLONDIE: He’s just staying in character. […] I don’t think Robbie’s turning into Pardieux. We work out our problems in the caverns and then we leave them there.

It’s been a while since we were reminded that Mazes and Monsters is a game meant to help us Work Out Our Problems. But it is. Who knows how many thousands it helped during the 80s? Such a powerful healing tool was undoubtedly invaluable for professional psychologists. I bet this scenario played out a lot:

PSYCHOLOGIST: Hmm, your marriage does seem to be troubled. Perhaps we should try some role-play. (lights candles) You are standing before the greatest adventure of all: marriage. Shall ye enter?
HUSBAND and WIFE: Aye! (dice are rolled)
WIFE: I slew a Gorville!
ALL: Marriage saved!

But for every problem solved, there is a life ruined. For every yin, there is a Hanks. The game really should come with a warning to that effect.

Mazes and Monsters is a game about FUN – but it is also a game about self-improvement. Mazes and Monsters players work out their problems in the game and then they leave them there.

Like any respectable psychological tool – hypnotism, LSD, lobotomy, Scientology – Mazes and Monsters is dangerous if used improperly. Don’t try to work out serious real-life problems until you are high enough level to deal with them! And never play the game except under the guidance of a fully licensed Maze Controller!

The other fact to notice about this scene: Blondie writes off some pretty wacky behavior – blessing people all the time, giving away his stuff – as “staying in character.” Well, we know that Blondie isn’t so smart. This is the guy that advocated splitting up when they were LARPING in the cave. But still, “staying in character” seems to be something that is acceptable within the Mazes and Monsters subculture.

A high-level Mazes and Monsters player may want to start acting like his character in the real world. This is perfectly normal. This is what Russian theater director Konstantin Stanislavski calls “staying in character”. It can help players gain the naturalistic playing style they really need to work out their problems in the game.

The next night, Tom Hanks again dreams of The Great Hall!

HALL: Pardieux. Next you must find the secret city under the earth.
HANKS: When?
HALL: When you have purified your mind as you have your body.
HANKS: I’m making a map!
HALL: When you are ready, you will need no map.

From Hanks’ madness we can glean game rules. He is a player, not the Maze Controller, and yet he feels it is his responsibility to make a map. Therefore, a player must be appointed to be the party mapper, as in Dungeons and Dragons.

Player Responsibilities

The players should be prepared to do a little work to ease the task of the Maze Controller.

One player should be the maze mapper. This player notes down the twists, turns, corridors, and rooms of the Maze. Only by studying the map will the players be able to reach the treasure.

Here’s Hanks’ map. Pretty nice, huh?

Next session, we’ll talk about XP!

We’ve come a long way in our exploration of the Mazes and Monsters rules. The old rules. The old, boring, sit-around-the-table rules. But now it’s time for the next stage of the game:

As I mentioned last week, JayJay (the guy who wears the hats) had a brain wave while looking for a quiet place to commit suicide: he invented the “next evolution of the game”, which turns out to be LARPing in a cave. This is an event as momentous as the D&D rules branching into Basic and Advanced D&D, and therefore deserves its own section of the rules, if not its own rule book.

Evolved Mazes and Monsters

Read this book second!

At some point, the psychic danger of the terrifying world of Mazes and Monsters, and the physical danger of death by candlefire, may not provide enough of a thrill for you. You and your players will be ready for an evolution of mazes and monsters, at a more sophisticated level.

WARNING: Evolved Mazes and Monsters is only for the most advanced players! If you have never played Mazes and Monsters at at least Level 9, CLOSE THIS BOOK NOW as its contents will certainly drive you into a mental state from which you may never recover!

There. Now that the less advanced players are gone, we can reveal the terrifying secrets of Evolved Mazes and Monsters: players dress in costumes and stand in a cave.

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Last week’s game session over, we see JJ and Blondie hangin’ out together, painting some miniatures. You know. Like you do, as bros.

Here we see JJ with his magifying glass. It was probably part of, like, a Sherlock Holmes costume (JJ’s schtick is that he loves costumes). Who knows, maybe the magnifying glass will come in handy again if he ever gets a job as Construction Producer on “Handyman Superstar Challenge”.

So apparently Mazes and Monsters minis are made out of paper? or cardboard? Anyway, they’re flimsy — providing nothing like the honest, slightly-toxic solidity of the lead miniature that D&D was using at the same time. Mazes and Monster’s publisher (whoever it was) just never had the money TSR did to produce licensed gamepieces. Luckily, the Mazes and Monsters minis are always conveniently facing the camera, so it looks like they’re not quite as ramshackle as they are.
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